Telephone cable adapters are old and well known. Telephone cable adapters are provided that divide conductors of a telephone cable into two branches for two telephones. Telephone cable-color code adapters are also provided that adapt and connect conductors of a telephone cable to conductors of another telephone cable or telephone set having the same number of conductor groups and connectors. It has not, however, been suggested that cable adapters could be provided to readily connect multi-connector telephone cables to non-corresponding multi-plug telephone sets. To the contrary, it has been the practice to wholly change the telephone cable system to utilize a new telephone set dissimilar from the old set.
In a telephone cable the conductors are paired and color coded to provide for wiring to the telephone system. Utilized are 10 different colors of wire insulation each with the same 10 colors as tracers on the insulation. The colors are blue (BL), orange (O), green (G), brown (BR), slate (S), white (W), red (R), black (BK), yellow (Y), and violet (V). This permits for 25 of pairs of conductors in the color code. These 25 pairs of typically terminated at sockets of a single female connector. In a telephone cable containing more than 25 pairs of conductors, the conductors are divided into groups typically of 20 or 25 pairs and terminated at more than one connector. Each group contains the same color code and has a colored string called a binder spiraled about the group. The colors of the binders of the differing groups of each cable follow the same color code as that of the conductor pairs. For example, a telephone cable of 75 pairs of conductors has blue (BL), orange (O), and green (G) binders. The same color code is used on the conductor pairs of the telephone cord, and the conductor pairs are terminated at pins of male plugs corresponding to the female connectors of the cable. In this way, the conductors of the cable can be readily connected by the service personnel to the proper terminals of the telephone set.
The problem is that different telephone sets correspond to different multi-group, multi-connector cables. For example, an 18-button telephone set is equipped with three 50-pin plugs and is used with a three-group, three-connector 75-pair telephone cable, while a 30-button Call-Director.sup.TM telephone set is equipped with five 50-pin plugs and is used with a five-group, five-connector 100-pair telephone cable. Therefore, if a telephone system is up-graded from the 18-button telephone set to the larger 30-button telephone set, it has been common practice to replace the 75-pair cable with a 100-pair cable. Generally, the 75-pair cable is wasted. Moreover, the placing and routing of telephone cables between the relay equipment and the telephone is the major time and expense in installing a telephone service. The routing of the cable can be either by conduit, overhead, floor duct or exposed fastener. Thus, the changing of a telephone cable system can be a larger and more expensive project than installation of the original service.
The present invention overcomes this difficulty and disadvantage of telephone installation. It provides a telephone cable adapter that automatically directs, distributes and translates conductor pairs of a telephone cable to the plugs and color code of a dissimilar multi-plug telephone set.